Gregory Heisler: 50 Portraits: Stories and Techniques from a Photographer's Photographer Author: Visit Amazon's Gregory Heisler Page | Language: English | ISBN:
0823085651 | Format: PDF
Gregory Heisler: 50 Portraits: Stories and Techniques from a Photographer's Photographer Description
Review
“There is no photographer alive I’d rather see a book from, period.” —David Hobby (Strobist)
About the Author
Gregory Heisler has been described as having “the eye of an artist, the mind of a scientist, and the heart of a journalist.” Renowned for his technical mastery and thoughtful responsiveness, he has photographed more than seventy cover portraits for
Time magazine, which reside in the permanent collection of The National Portrait Gallery. His iconic images and innovative visual essays have also graced the covers and pages of
Life, Esquire, GQ, Sports Illustrated, ESPN, Fortune, and
The New York Times Magazine. As a sought-after speaker and educator, he has taught at the International Center of Photography, the School of Visual Arts, the Smithsonian Institution, and the National Geographic Society, as well as scores of workshops and seminars throughout the country and around the world. He is currently Artist-in-Residence at the Hallmark Institute of Photography. He can be found at GregoryHeisler.com.
- Hardcover: 224 pages
- Publisher: Amphoto Books (October 22, 2013)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0823085651
- ISBN-13: 978-0823085651
- Product Dimensions: 12 x 9.3 x 1.3 inches
- Shipping Weight: 3.6 pounds
'50 Portraits: Stories and Techniques from a Photographer's Photographer' is remarkably open and honest, both from emotional/personal and technical/photographic points of view. And as beautiful as the photography is, you will not find the pictures the main takeaway from the book.
That last sentence feels strange and somehow sacrilegious to write, but it is absolutely true. And the title is actually a good representation of the book's focus. The pleasant surprise is that he is actually a very good writer, and you can hear him sitting and talking with you as you read it.
This is not a lighting book. Although, to be sure, there is a lot of lighting information in it. Perhaps more value in lighting education than any book I have ever read. What this is, is a 360-degree experience. Each of his fifty portraits gets its own little mini-chapter. The segment leads off with the photo, run full-page if vertical and double-truck if horizontal. The accompanying copy begins with the thought process leading up to the photo -- all of the thousand little things that happen before you press the shutter. You are there, with him, inside his thought process.
And in so many of the portraits, I could see the multiple instances in which I would have failed to come up with the solutions to make great pictures. It's disheartening, in a sense. Like watching someone effortlessly navigate all the way through a video game that had repeatedly stopped you.
Except, it's not effortless. What you get from this is a true sense of the work ethic (or "thought ethic?") that being a great photographer requires. And there is so, so much pre-thinking that goes into consistently being able to make great photos. That may be the biggest takeaway from this.
Years ago, when I was starting out as an adventure photographer, I asked a mentor of mine to recommend a book. He suggested Galen Rowell's "Mountain Light". I read and I read, looking for hard, technical information that I could replicate on my own adventures and came up utterly empty. How could a photography book be so devoid of this valuable information? It was only years later, after I'd gotten over (or at least more comfortable with) my obsession with the technical bits of photography and going back to that book, that I began to understand the opportunity I'd missed.
Heisler's "50 Portraits" is exactly that sort of book. Though you can get the technical info by digging into the back, you would totally miss the best this book has to offer in doing so. The real gift is reading Heisler's words. Image by image, he tells the story behind every capture in intricate detail. From the initial assignment call and pre-visualization of the concept, to the stomach-churning stress of the sometimes chaotic moments preceding the final capture, when all of his plans seemed to be falling down around him like the fractured walls of an dilapidated building - this is the insight that no quantity of cookie-cutter workshops could ever provide. Subject interaction, achieving the proper emotion, selecting the context to match the sitter - all of this and more are what makes up the real value of this book.
There is no shortage of info out there about light modifiers, daylight balancing, broad lighting vs. short lighting and so on. But great photography is about so much more than that - it's about the whole creative process and knowing which of all those tricks will work best to compliment a person or an environment and why.
Gregory Heisler: 50 Portraits: Stories and Techniques from a Photographer's Photographer Preview
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